Officer Debra Clayton had a passion for helping kids.
Clayton loved to mentor kids, attend events
Four years ago, when Vionn Welcome was 12 years old, he had little respect for police officers.
Then the Orlando youth joined the Dueling Dragons of Orlando, a rowing team sponsored by the Orlando Police Department, and met Master Sgt. Debra Clayton.
She had “the brightest smile,” he said, and changed his outlook on police.
“They’re humans, just like us,” he said. “They eat just like us. They sleep just like us. They breathe air just like us. … We’re all the same.”
Vionn, now 16, was one of several Dueling Dragons veterans who gathered Tuesday at the Rosemont Community Center to remember Clayton, the 17-year department veteran killed Monday while trying to stop a murder suspect at an Orlando Wal-Mart.
The funeral for Clayton, who is survived by a husband, 24-year-old son, father and brother, is scheduled for 2 p.m. Saturday at First Baptist Church of Orlando.
Clayton, 42, had a passion for helping kids from low-income neighborhoods, according to friends. She grew up poor herself.
She also was troubled in recent years by tension between the black community and police in cities across the country that led to distrust and violence and wanted to work to mend that rift.
“Debra wasn’t just a beat cop. She was in churches. She was everywhere,” said Orlando City Commissioner Regina Hill, a friend who worked on those issues with her.
Clayton also went to community events and spent time with Neighborhood Watch groups, Hill said.
“She told me she loved to tell her testimony, her story about growing up in Orlando in a low-income family and how she wanted to be that example, when girls and boys that are brown and black see her, to know that they can overcome their situation,” Hill said.
Clayton grew up in Orlando, raised by her grandmother. She graduated from Dr. Phillips High School and the University of Central Florida and later got a master’s degree.
Glenton Gilzean Jr., president and chief executive of the Central Florida Urban League, said she had volunteered with his group for 10 years.
When he got the news that she had been killed, “I broke down crying,” he said.
He saw first-hand the impact she had young people.
Clayton mentored a local high school girl, Gilzean said, who was on the verge of dropping out, but Clayton spent time with her, gave her encouragement, and by the end of the semester, the student had a report card with nothing but As and Bs.
“That’s the kind of commitment that the master sergeant had. I just wish I had more master sergeants to go around with these kids,” he said.
Clayton also worked to combat black-on-black crime, Hill said, and worked to improve relations between Orlando’s black community and law enforcement.
In July, she set up a corporation, Law Enforcement Community Unity Consultants Inc., named herself president and laid the groundwork to make it a nonprofit, Gilzean said. She wanted to work locally and as a consultant elsewhere, he said.
“She always wanted to find solutions to bring the African-American community together with law enforcement,” Gilzean said, “overcome this notion of ‘snitching’ and all that other nonsense.”
Every year, Clayton helped with a “Stop the Violence” rally in Parramore, an annual vigil that commemorates the people in Orlando and Orange County who have died in the past year from gun violence, said Jack Williams, a long-time family friend and founder of the group that holds the rally.
Williams broke down into tears Tuesday when he talked about it. “Lord, have mercy. I’m just so hurt. … I could never imagine that this year I’d be doing a special symbolic memorial for Debra,” he said.
In 2015, Clayton helped chaperone two busloads of Orlando-area youngsters who went to Washington, D.C., as part of the anti-violence Million Youth Peace March, Williams said.
“Even though the weather was bad — it rained all the time we were there — we had a lot of fun. … They got a chance to go to the White House, the Capitol building, the Smithsonian,” Williams said. “They were so excited, and Debra was so excited.”
Clayton’s death will echo across Orlando, Hill said.
“People have to realize that behind the badge, the uniform and guns is everyday people that serve and protect us, put their lives in harm’s way,” Hill said. “Debra lived and died doing what she was passionate about, serving our community, protecting our community.” rstutzman@orlandose ntinel.com or 407-650-6394; jeweiner@orlando sentinel.com or 407-420-5171